The basic
difference Aristotle
draws between tragedy and other genres,
such as comedy and the
epic, is the "tragic pleasure of pity and fear" the audience feel
watching a tragedy. In order for the tragic hero to arouse these
feelings in the audience, he cannot be either all good or all evil
but must be someone the audience can identify with; however, if he
is superior in some way(s), the tragic pleasure is intensified. His
disastrous end results from a mistaken action, which in turn
arises from a tragic flaw or from a tragic error in judgment. Often
the tragic flaw is hubris, an excessive pride that causes
the hero to ignore a divine warning or to break a moral law. It
has been suggested that because the tragic hero's suffering is
greater than his offense, the audience feels pity; because the
audience members perceive that they could behave similarly, they
feel pity. Click here for excerpts from Aristotle's
Poetics.